It's been a long year and before I update you about all the exciting developments ahead in 2023 and beyond, I want to say THANK YOU. To all of you, everyone who's donated to THE NINE PLUS CLUB, you gave me a chance to continue documenting an unknown piece of gay New York history, and I'm so excited about what we've got in store. 

Thanks to your financial support and enthusiasm for the project, my crew and I were able to:

We are currently on track to finish THE NINE PLUS CLUB in 2023 and there's another exciting bit of news. In the process of shooting and editing the film this year, it became clear that we actually have enough material for a feature that looks at the broader history of the gay leather and motorcycle club scene across the US. That documentary, titled IN LOVING BROTHERHOOD, will explore the many other clubs that formed alongside the Nine Plus Club all over the country. By giving to NINE PLUS, you made this development possible. Two films out of one!

Here's our logline for the new doc:

"IN LOVING BROTHERHOOD traces the 35-year evolution of the gay leather scene from 1954-1989 through unfiltered conversations with the pioneering founders of the early gay leather and motorcycle clubs which became a lifeline to men struggling to find their place in society. Busting stereotypes of gay leathermen as rough and reckless macho men, IN LOVING BROTHERHOOD shows how these men practiced community care, taught each other self-acceptance and built chosen families."

Last month, I flew to Los Angeles to film interviews with members of the Satyrs, the oldest gay motorcycle club in the world, film former Nine Plus Club-goers Peter Fiske and Ted Heaney being inducted into the Leather Hall of Fame; and earlier this fall I interviewed former Atlantic Motorcycle Coordinating Committee President Paul Rose, who was a member of the DC-based gay motorcycle club Spartans; famed leatherwoman and historian Vi Carter-Johnson, who were mentored by members of Nine Plus; and attended two motorcycle runs - in Southern Virginia and Baltimore, to scout for leather elders and club members to interview for the film.

Next up, in 2023, as we put the finishing touches on Nine Plus, I have plans to film 10 additional interviews with prominent leather elders, film leather club events in the mid-atlantic, midwest and south, and document the legendary Satyrs’ run at Badger Flatts in late summer.

That's why I'm running a year-end campaign to raise additional funds to be able to undertake these shoots. If you'd like to donate additional funds, as before, all contributions are fully tax-deductible and can be made here: https://fundraising.fracturedatlas.org/oral-histories-film-series/general_support An additional $10, $20, or $50 will go a long way.

You have all been so generous to contribute this year, and times are tough for everyone, so if you can't chip in, I totally understand. But if you can - or know anyone who might be interested in coming on as a producer - it will all go towards my continued work of preserving our gay, sex positive history and telling the stories of elders who paved the roads we're traveling on today.

Thank You Again for Your Continued Support and All my Love to You and Yours during this holiday season! 2023 is gonna be major!

xxx
Adam Baran
director
"THE NINE PLUS CLUB" & "IN LOVING BROTHERHOOD

Greetings Nine Plus Club lovers!

It’s been an incredible 2 weeks finishing the last two major shoots in Chicago and New York that we need to finish the documentary. I’ve been dying to tell you all about it. 

On Friday, March 25th, my amazing cinematographer Daniel Lam and I flew out to the Second City. The next day, we headed over to the Leather Museum & Archives to meet the amazing folks there and do a little preliminary research before our shoot was set to begin the following day. When we arrived we met Mel Leverich, who had been my main contact at the museum and helped gather a lot of amazing material that informed my understanding of the Nine Plus Club and the NY gay motorcycle club. Mel took us on a tour of the museum, and if you are interested in queer history and especially leather history, you must go. The LM theater features enormous, breathtaking murals by Etienne that once lined the walls of Chicago’s famed Second City leather bar. Dan and I immediately determined that we wanted to shoot at least one of our scheduled interviews in this room, with the murals as backdrop. 

Passing through the theater, we wandered back into the archives where the building’s library room is, noting incredible vintage editions of classic texts of Leather, kink and S&M erotica. We then went downstairs, where club banners from many important leather and motorcycle clubs were affixed to the walls - including The Nine Plus Club, NY Levi’s Club, Entre Nous of Boston and many more. The downstairs area features a variety of smaller exhibitions within its space, including an area devoted to women’s kink and leather practices, a mini screening room where erotic S&M short films screen, and the current exhibition “Band of Bikers,” which showcases the incredible photographs of three early 70s motorcycle runs. These photos were familiar to me, because when we interviewed Leather elder Mark Mathews, formerly of Wheels MC and Nine Plus, he showed us the beautiful book that first collected these polaroid photos, and pointed out where he was in the photos. We said hi to Mark again when we found his photos on the wall, and then went back to the library where Mel had begun to lay out the files I had requested.

My first priority was to look through the Nine Plus club folder they had, where I was thrilled to find a new issue of Scimitar, the club’s monthly zine, that I hadn’t yet seen. Mel said it had just been discovered, and it had some great information about the Nine Plus Club’s filmed leather version of West Side Story (which was a sequel of sorts after the success of their leather Sound of Music). I also started to look through files for other gay MC clubs, including the Rochester Rams, the Philadelphia-based Thunderbolts, and many others. I was really eager to amass as much archival material as I could for the film. We stayed there a few hours and then went back to our hotel to rest up for the following days’ shooting. 

The next day we arrived at the Leather Archives and Dan went to work shooting interiors of the Leather Archives while I started watching VHS tapes of gay mc runs in the 1980s looking for any useable b-roll clips. I soon found some really incredible performances from run shows (lipsynced leather musicals kind of like the Rusicals on RuPauls Drag Race ) including an amazing clip of a Leatherman singing an adaptation of Do-Rei-Mi from Sound of Music with lyrics explaining the hanky code. I also watched footage of a 1960s run in California and started to listen to an audio interview with Bob Guenther, a leatherman whose recorded interview gave us a great soundbite to explain what happened to the Nine Plus that led to it’s diminished role in the leather scene in the 1980s. After Dan finished shooting the artifacts in the space, we went into the actual archives, a locked room that’s the chief domain of Leslie Anderson, the museum’s leather preservation expert and an expert on the East Coast gay leather club scene.

Dan and I began to set up a little black backdrop within the archives, where we planned to physically display artifacts in the archive. Since so much of our reconstruction of the club is about sifting through archival materials, we wanted to highlight the way this history (and all queer history) is mainly preserved through these rare pieces. We first placed a cassette tape player in the center of the frame and put an interview with Jim Dunne, a pioneering deaf leatherman from Chicago who used to travel to NYC and discussed how much fun the Nine Plus Club was. Then we played Bob Guenther’s taped interview. Next we swapped out the tape player for a small TV/VCR where we ran clips of Nine Plus Club members at runs in the 1980s and performing at run shows. We stayed there for a long time, and Leslie brought us Jim Dunne’s leather jacket, leather elder and Stonewall veteran Peter Fiske’s (one of our interview subjects) leather jacket, and lots of pins and patches. We left very tired but buzzing with excitement.

The next day we arrived bright and early to set up for our interview with Gary Chichester,a former bartender at Chicago’s Second City who had terrific insight into the Chicago MC scene and Chuck Renslow. Renslow famously owned Second City, along with many other gay businesses, bathhouses, clubs, and venues - and was involved in city politics to help make the city a very tolerant place to businesses with sex, kink or leather taking place in them. After Gary’s interview, we broke for lunch and then set up for a long afternoon interview with Leslie. 

Leslie’s interview was truly incredible. He offered incredibly complex and deep insights into the various club’s histories, the psychology of leather fetishists and BDSM practitioners and much more. When we were done, three hours later, we went back downstairs and continued filming archival materials until we had to go. On Tuesday, we interviewed Gary Wasdin, the Archives’ director, who offered different, but no less fascinating insights into BDSM, leather, kink, and generational relationships within “the scene”. 

The rest of Tuesday afternoon we set up the camera with an overhead rig so we could film gorgeous close-ups of printed materials relating to the Nine Plus Club and other clubs. It was so much fun to play with these materials. Wednesday we returned and kept filming more magazines, scanning others, and getting ready to finish our shoot. At 4:30 we had loaded up the car, hugged everyone at the Museum and went to return our equipment. After we had done that, we went to try and film some b-roll of Chicago locations, but some heavy rain and fog made it a bit challenging. We ended our shoot filming the street sign that was erected in honor of Chuck Renslow in nearby Andersonville.

Dan and I flew back to NYC on Thursday, with the plan to re-convene on Sunday to film our three young leathermen going out to the Eagle’s Sunday beer bust. Alas it was not to be, as Dan had a possible COVID exposure and had to lockdown until getting the all-clear. Luckily my friend Derek Howard stepped in and took over in a very short time so we didn’t have to cancel the shoot. The idea behind this shoot was to interview some young leatherfolk for the end of the film, to get some perspective on how the scene has evolved from the 1970s, which was not an especially friendly time in the Leather world for folks who were femme, Trans, POC and more. Our three young subjects, Cameron, Santos and Kenzo are part of the next generation of leatherfolk who are welcoming new faces, voices, and perspectives into the scene.

Derek and I arrived at Cameron’s hotel and went up to his room where we filmed him and Kenzo getting their looks ready for the beer blast. Then we followed them as they walked over to the Eagle, and once at the bar, we followed them into the Eagle’s amazing new bar space extension where the crowd was having a hot and humpy time dancing and drinking. It was great to see Kenzo - who is the 2022 Mr. Eagle, with Cameron - who was recently named Mr. Snowbound 2022, in their element at the Eagle. Friends and fans and the curious greeted them or struck up conversations. We filmed b-roll for about an hour and then left them to enjoy the place on their own.

The next day - Monday - Derek and I picked up lighting equipment and arrived at the Eagle hoping to shoot in the new room. Unfortunately, there had been a double booking, and there was a Nasty Pig photo shoot with jockstrapped beefcakes taking place in the room we were hoping to shoot in. But you have to improvise, so we went upstairs to the second floor and found a great new spot to film in. Cameron arrived, in “full cow” as leatherfolk say, and we did a terrific interview with him about his relatively new experiences as part of the Leather scene. After Cameron was finished, Santos arrived, armed with deep insights as a kink educator concentrating on gay trans men. Finally around 3PM, the Nasty Pig crew left and we were able to get in the new space at the Eagle for Kenzo’s interview. Kenzo had a lot of great things to say and even did a little voguing for us at the end. Maybe that’ll make it into the film… We’ll see. :)

Overall it was an incredibly fulfilling shoot, and here is the part where I say that we could literally not have made this shoot happen without all of your support, both financial and emotional. We are preserving an important piece of gay history and it is just so much fun to sift through this material and get to know the pioneering leathermen who blazed the trail in the 60s and 70s. I really feel in my element as a filmmaker, doing something I am proud of and doing it as best I know how. I also want to thank our incredible crew, cinematographers Daniel Lam and Derek Howard, sound recordists Shuling Yong & Robert LaRosa, and our PAs Puja Mohindra & Johnny Taranto. 

Now I’m off to Palm Springs and LA for some relaxation! Then back to the edit!

Thank you all for making this all possible!!!

Xxoxoxox

Adam 

HI 9-PLUSSERS!

It's been a super busy few weeks since the official end of our fundraising campaign and as you all know we hit our goal and exceeded it. Now I'm heading to Chicago on Friday to film at the Leather Museum and Archives (who have been huge supporters of this project) and interview experts and Chicago-based leather elders. We also have our date scheduled to interview the "next generation of Leatherfolk" after we return from the Windy City. We couldn't have scheduled these shoots - which should be the final piece of the documentary that we need to get - without your donations and support.

But before I go, I'll be stopping by The Eagle tomorrow night (Wednesday) to speak about The Nine Plus Club at "RISING: EMERGING VOICES IN QUEER ART", a panel organized as part of the Eagle's Intergenerational Social Series "Continuum". My fellow panelists are visual artist Ernesto Renda and dancer and choreographer Fadi J Khoury. The host for the event is the fabulous Witti Repartee. The event starts at 7PM and if you come in person I'll be showing a sneak preview clip of The Nine Plus Club! For all others the panel will be streaming on The Eagle's Facebook page. Hope you can all make it! And thanks again for all your support! XOXOX AB

Wow! In the last day of the fundraising campaign, I'm thrilled to announce that THE NINE PLUS CLUB received a Short Film Grant from New York's Rooftop Films! Here's the big exclusive  announcement in Indiewire just published today!

https://www.indiewire.com/2022/02/rooftop-films-2022-filmmaker-fund-winners-radha-blank-1234702342/

On a personal level, I'm thrilled to receive my first ever grant from a major film organization, but I'm even more excited that Rooftop is (like all of you amazing donors) supporting a film that celebrates sex positive culture and history in LGBTQ spaces! I can't wait to show it to you when it's all done! 

Have a great week!

Hi all my wonderful Nine Plus Club supporters! First, let me - and our team - thank you for your generosity over the past 2+ months. Watching these donations come in, especially during uncertain times like today, has been amazing and I am so grateful that so many of you (nearly 400!) are eager to see the history of 9+ preserved for future generations. 

We are less than 3 weeks and 1500 dollars away from hitting our 25K goal, but because as some of you saw when donating, Fractured Atlas takes a cut and there are cc processing fees, we actually need to exceed our goal by a few thousand dollars to hit the 25K. So please, if you haven't yet, share the link to the campaign on your social media feed or pass it on to any friends who may be interested in chipping in even a small amount. 

In the next few days, I'll share some excerpts from our interviews with you so you can get a taste of what my team has been cooking up!

All my best and thanks again for supporting queer stories on film!
xx
Adam

Through the generosity of our donors we've managed to raise over 20% of our end goal in just five days! Thank you, thank you, thank you!